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She texted back immediately and I responded while making my way downstairs. First, we need a new name for this operation. Second, it’s day four. The day you got there and his birthday counts. Third, seriously what is up with this guy? Is it part of his artistic process or something?
No…I don’t know. I replied. But I wasn’t giving up. If I had to nurse him back to health so that he could write then that’s what I would do.
TUESDAY
I walked up the stairs to his house holding the grocery bags from Nevis’s Grocery and Liquor Store. I was fully prepared to drop it next to the door and knock, but as I approached I saw that his door was cracked open and creepily swaying back and forth on its hinges.
“Malachi?” I called out but got no reply.
Leaning closer I called out once more. “Malachi? You home?”
Silence.
Sucking up my fear, I pushed the door slightly and peeked in. Seeing no sign of him, I finally let myself in.
It was hard to believe I’d cleaned the place on Saturday. Notebook paper was everywhere, along with mugs—not one or two, but at least four different mugs, just laying all over the living room. Two of them were shattered. The handle of one was sitting in a pile of its own broken body on the ground. The couch was moved oddly, the lamp that had previously resided on the coffee table was now on the ground with its lightbulb shattered as well.
“Malachi?” I called again as I placed the groceries on the couch. I turned towards the stairs but bent down to pick up a few of the papers from ground.
Ink.
No, it was paint. Black paint. There were Arabic words, the calligraphy was frantic, jarring, with paint spatters all over it.
Father. The first word read, on the next paper: Forgive. Followed by: Pain. Then Anarkali which was a name. My Arabic wasn’t the best but I believe it meant red blossoming. The longest phrase was written in red. Love asked and I said yes.
I gathered the papers together before making my way up to his room. The door was cracked open as well, and there, lying on his bed in nothing but his jeans, I found him staring blankly at something in the room. I saw that he’d abandoned the mugs, opting instead to bring the whole coffee pot to his room. Even that was empty, except for the smallest brown liquid within it.
“Malachi?” I whispered as I stepped inside and tried to get him to look at me.
But he remained silent as tears fell from his eyes without his control. Now that I was further into the room I turned and followed his gaze. And there, leaning against a few other blank canvases, was an Indian woman with long dark brown hair, dressed in green and gold traditional clothes. In the corner of the painting I saw the date written in white—1599.
I lifted the papers in my hand and motioned at her.
“Anarkali?” I asked turning to him. “Is she Anarkali?”
He blinked slowly and his dazed blue eyes looked to me, like he couldn’t focus on me and was instead looking right through me.
“I killed her,” he whispered. “I killed her to spare her the pain…I shouldn’t have! I should have held on! He would have forgiven us! He was going to forgive us! I’m sure he was. We could have stopped them! We could have lived happily ever after but I killed her! I KILLED HER!”
“Malachi!” I dropped the papers and rushed to his side as he coughed and rolled himself into a ball.
“No. Please. No!” He begged rocking back and forth with his head in his hands.
“What do I do? What’s wrong?!” I yelled touching his arm but he just shook and rolled over, with his back to me. He cried out one final time before he slipped into unconsciousness. “Malachi!”
He was ice cold and shivering as though he were naked in the middle of the North Pole. Unable to pull the blankets from under him, I wrapped him up as best as I could but he still wouldn’t stop shaking so I laid next to him and held him as tightly as I could.
“You’re going to be okay,” I whispered at his back. “You’re going to be okay. It’s only in your head. You’re going to be okay.”
I didn’t realize I was crying until my vision blurred. I held on and didn’t dare let go repeating that he’d be okay over and over while praying that he would be.
***
“Grandpa, he’s not well!”
“Esther—”
“No! Don’t Esther me, Grandpa! Don’t talk to me like I’m overacting! For the last five hours, I’ve watched as he whimpered in pain, confessed to a murder that happened over four hundred years ago and begged for death twice. He thinks he’s the former prince of the Mughal Empire!” This was insane! Malachi was not sane, he needed medical treatment not to be writing books!
